By Robert Simonson
Arguments in "Rent" dramaturg Lynn Thompson's appeal against the Jonathan Larson estate were completed on March 26, leaving Thompson and her lawyers hopeful about her chances of finally profiting from the hit musical on which she worked.
"The arguments, we thought, went quite well," Thompson's lawyer Russell Smith told Back Stage. "We're very confident we'll be found to have rights to 'Rent.' "
Thompson, who was hired in 1995 to assist Jonathan Larson, the late composer of "Rent," has been trying to assert authorship of nearly half the musical's book and 9% of the lyrics since filing suit in the fall of 1996. By her account, and several others, she spent weeks with Larson, furiously reworking the show's structure, themes, and characters. At the time, she was paid a flat fee of $2,000 for her services, but claimed that Larson had always intended to acknowledge her contributions, but made no formal motion before his sudden death on Jan. 25, 1996, of an aortic aneurysm. The Larson heirs have vociferously denied Thompson's authorship to any part of "Rent."
Smith is hopeful that the three-judge appeals panel will rule in Thompson's favor, though such a ruling, he said, could take one of two forms. "It's not at all certain from what the judge said that Lynn Thompson will be found a co-author," said Smith. "But one way or the other, we got a clear sense from the court that she is an author of 'Rent,' and either will have copyrights on her own, or, if not, copyrights together with the Larson heirs."
Smith has maintained that Thompson is a co-author, which would entitle her to the rights of half of the material she allegedly wrote with Larson. According to Smith, however, one of the judges commented that it would be hard to argue that Thompson had ever turned over her copyright to Larson. In that light, Thompson would be viewed as a sole author of the material she wrote.
A decision finding the latter scenario to be true would be far more damaging to the Larson estate, said Smith. Thompson as a sole author would wield much more power over her words. She could, for instance, decide to pull her material from the show, conceivably halting productions of "Rent."
"I'm for the co-author theory," said Smith. "But if she's not a co-author, we argue that there is no black hole in the copyright law where you lose your rights."
The lawyers for the Larson Estate did not return a phone call by press time.
The appeal, which was held at the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan, came only eight months after the original trial. Smith credited the relative speed of the process to original Judge Lewis A. Kaplan's decision to expedite the case. The appeal panel--made up of Judges Wilfred Feinberg, Guido Calabresi, and Myron Bright--is expected to hand down a verdict within three months time